Launching the Greek forensic DNA database. The legal framework and arising ethical issues

Abstract Since the creation of the first national DNA database in Europe in 1995, many European countries have legislated laws for initiating and regulating their own databases. The Greek government legislated a law in 2008, by which the National DNA Database of Greece was founded and regulated. Acc...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Forensic science international : genetics 2011-11, Vol.5 (5), p.407-410
Main Authors: Voultsos, Polychronis, Njau, Samuel, Tairis, Nikolaos, Psaroulis, Dimitrios, Kovatsi, Leda
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Databases, Genetic
DNA - genetics
Ethics
Forensic Genetics
Greece
Humans
Pathology
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Abstract Since the creation of the first national DNA database in Europe in 1995, many European countries have legislated laws for initiating and regulating their own databases. The Greek government legislated a law in 2008, by which the National DNA Database of Greece was founded and regulated. According to this law, only DNA profiles from convicted criminals were recorded. Nevertheless, a year later, in 2009, the law was amended to permit the creation of an expanded database including innocent people and children. Unfortunately, the new law is very vague in many aspects and does not respect the principle of proportionality. Therefore, according to our opinion, it will soon need to be re-amended. Furthermore, prior to legislating the new law, there was no debate with the community itself in order to clarify what system would best suit Greece and what the citizens would be willing to accept. We present the current legal framework in Greece, we highlight issues that need to be clarified and we discuss possible ethical issues that may arise.
ISSN:1872-4973
1878-0326
DOI:10.1016/j.fsigen.2010.08.013